Nemanthus sp.

(first photo: Stas Alpin : specimens from Maldive Islands, Indian Ocean
other photos: John Dench : specimens from South Africa)

This species has very characteristic exterior and color and could be easily recognized underwater and on the photos. Its taxonomic position is not clear and we had no chance to examine specimens to clarify identification. Usually the photos of this species are labeled either as Antiparactis or as Nemanthus. The former identification is probably based on a photo of very similar specimens from Galapagos Islands published in a paper of Fautin et al (2007) and identified as Antiparactis sp.. On the other hand exterior of the species closely resembles original descriptions of species included in Nemanthus, in particular Nemanthus californicus, and currently Nemanthus appear to be more reasonable identification than Antiparactis. Currently genus Nemanthus includes three species, although according to some authors (Lavaleye and Den Hartog, 1995) the genus may contain only one widely distributed species.